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Darcy Regier was jogging through his Clarence neighborhood last July when a car stopped and the driver shouted congratulations.

The driver, one of Regier's neighbors, congratulated the Buffalo Sabres general manager on the fact that the nearly-yearlong labor dispute between the National Hockey League and its players association had ended.

The neighbor's reaction crystallized for Regier that Western New York was ready to welcome the team back.

"We lost touch with our fans for a year, and now we've got a lot of work to do to reconnect with our fans," Regier said.

That, in short, describes the challenge facing the Buffalo Sabres and, ostensibly, the rest of the NHL.

The new NHL season, which begins on Oct. 5, will test fan support. Losing the 2004-05 season to the labor dispute hurt the league and its 30 teams.

"It's going to be tough," said Wayne Redshaw, a Port Colborne-based sports writer who has covered the Sabres since the team's first game in 1970. Redshaw is also president of the Western New York chapter of the Professional Hockey Writers' Association. "The Sabres are going to have to rebuild the fans' confidence from day one," he says.

For the Sabres, the labor dispute came at a bad time. Inroads made during the 2003-04 season were all but wiped out.

The franchise, under the new ownership of Rochester businessman B. Thomas Golisano, was making strides, bringing more fans into HSBC Arena. After suffering through a dark period that saw the team's former owner, John Rigas, arrested and subsequently convicted on federal fraud charges, Golisano brought stability.

Golisano rolled back ticket prices and created a more fan-friendly atmosphere in HSBC Arena. The result was that attendance at Sabres games rose 11 percent during the 2003-04 season, from 13,776 the previous year to 15,288.

Still, the Sabres lost $8 million during the 2003-04 season and had one of the league's lowest season-ticket bases, approximately 7,000.

The Sabres this year have instituted a variable pricing schedule, depending on the opponent and day of the week, and at the same time rolled back ticket prices from 12 percent to 28 percent - again depending on the location of the seats.

"Lowering the prices is one of the best stepping stones they've done," Redshaw said.

It has paid off some earlier dividends for the team.

The Sabres have passed the 8,000 mark for full-time season-ticket holders - still well short of Golisano's goal of 12,000 season tickets or season-ticket equivalents, but also the team's highest mark since the 2001-02 season. Just after its 1999 Stanley Cup run, the Sabres had 12,367 season-ticket holders.

Michael Gilbert, Sabres director of public relations, said the team picked up 1,200 new full-season ticket holders since the lockout ended in late July.

That doesn't surprise Jordan Levy, one of the co-founders of the Center Ice Club, a group of business leaders who support the team by buying season tickets and getting friends and associates to do the same.

"What surprises me is that no one has said 'No' when we ask them about buying tickets," Levy said. "That's about as good as it gets."

The NHL is reporting that league-wide season-ticket renewals are up about 3 percent compared to 2003-04. The league is reporting that 19 of its 30 teams have seen increases of at least 1,000 in season tickets or season ticket-equivalents.

The Florida Panthers expect to have an opening-day season-ticket count of around 9,000, up from the 7,200 the club had at the end of the 2003-04 season. The Mighty Ducks of Anaheim are projecting that their season-ticket base will top the 9,000 mark. In 2003-04, the Ducks had a season-ticket base of less than 8,000.

Levy said he is encouraged by the stronger-than-anticipated ticket sales the Sabres have been experiencing, but at the same time, he warns nothing should be assumed or taken for granted.

Piling up some victories early in the season will make it easier for the Sabres and the Center Ice Club to rally support from ticket buyers.

It also helps, Levy said, that Buffalo's hockey roots go back to the Buffalo Bisons in the American Hockey League.

"Buffalo is a hockey town," Levy said.

That said, the team still has to live up to its preseason expectations.

The Sabres haven't been in the playoffs since 2001, but they finished the 2003-04 season just six points out of a playoff spot.

Fans responded by filling more seats in HSBC Arena, and a foundation for further growth seemed to be taking hold when the labor dispute hit. Golisano scored points with the fans in the summer of 2004 when he announced that they only had to put $50 down to secure their season tickets.

"All teams are going to have to win back their fans' trust and confidence," said Becky Wallace, executive editor of Team Marketing Report, a national trade publication. "The teams - and I mean all teams - are going to have to buy back their fans with lower ticket prices and other promotions."

While the Sabres have had a loyal following since the team's inception in 1970, the new season and the new NHL era will be critical in cementing that 35-year-old relationship.

Regier knows that.

The Sabres front office has devised such promotional efforts as lowering ticket prices, with some available for as little as $10 per game.

Also, thanks to the team's new deal with the MSG Network, 75 games will be on TV - not only in the Buffalo Niagara market but also, for the first time since the 2002-03 season, in Rochester and Syracuse. The team is exploring ways to get some of its games shown in Southern Ontario.

Ultimately, the success and future of the Sabres will rest in how well the team does on the ice.

"At the end of the day, the focus will still be on the team," Regier said. "Personally, I am really curious to see how we will be received."

Some early returns show that the fan base is more than ready to welcome back the team. More than 17,000 fans went to HSBC Arena for a Sept. 17 exhibition game against the Washington Capitals.

"There may be a sour taste in some fans' mouths, but I honestly believe the Sabres will win their fans back," Redshaw said.

The stands at the arena and the Amherst Pepsi Center have been filled with people watching open practices, another sign that the hockey faithful have not lost interest in the team.

When Major League Baseball returned from its labor dispute in 1995, some teams were met with a tepid fan response. Some anger and venom was directed at the players.

"Baseball had to buy back a lot of its fans with promotions and lower ticket prices," Wallace said. "So did the NBA."

During the NHL labor dispute, Regier said, the team didn't receive a lot of feedback from fans.

"My concern was, there was a lot of indifference," Regier said.

That's why he was pleasantly surprised when his neighbor congratulated him on that July afternoon.

"I've been pleasantly surprised by the response so far from our fans," Regier said. "But I know we do have a lot of things to prove to our fans."

Forget about the pundits, Regier said the pressure to succeed is coming from within the Sabres organization. The stakes go beyond the win-loss column.

A losing record from the start would not only hurt the Sabres in the NHL standings, but also hamper efforts to sell tickets and land sponsorship deals.

"Internally, we have very high expectations," Regier said.

Sponsors, like season-ticket holders, appear ready to jump back on the Sabres bandwagon. The Sabres are reporting that virtually all of their major sponsors from the 2003-04 season are back and the club is close to finalizing several new sponsors that they expect to announce by the Oct. 5 season opener.

Sponsorship packages vary depending on a number of factors and promotional tie-ins. Some can be had for the low-five-figure range, while others are six figures or higher.

Sponsorship dollars account for more than 40 percent of the team's bottom line, trailing tickets but ahead of merchandising revenues.

Sam Carubba, one of the owners of Carubba Collision, said he had no problem supporting the team as soon as the lockout ended. His company sponsors the "Carubba Collision" in each game, usually a play in which colliding skaters are sent sprawling. Carubba has been a Sabres sponsor since the early 1990s.

"Hockey fans are a lot more of a forgiving crowd than, say, baseball," Carubba said.

Being a Sabres sponsor was a no-brainer for Carubba.

Carubba said he gets a lot of collision work through his Sabres marketing deals. Following the Sept. 17 exhibition game, Carubba said he picked up four new customers at his West Seneca shop because of a promotion he ran at the game.

"Personally, I'm very gung-ho about what's going on with the Sabres and how they've responded to their fans to win them back," Carubba said.

If the Sabres' internal expectations are high, the public's are even higher. Simply put, they want to see the team not only make the playoffs, but advance far into the postseason tournament.

The Sabres didn't jump deeply in the NHL's free-agent market once the new labor agreement was reached. Instead, the team is putting its faith and future in the hands of younger players like Thomas Vanek, Ryan Miller and Derek Roy.

"For the Sabres, it really comes down to one three-letter word - win," Redshaw said. "The team has to get on a roll early."

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